Ahhh…the easy life of a charter boat Captain. Nothing but fun in the sun with cold beer, big fish, and cute ladies, right?
Sounds good in theory, but in practice these guys have one of the toughest jobs around. It’s especially tough when you have to get your hook back from this guy:
Captain Carlos still has all ten fingers, so we’re guessing that this de-hook went without incident and the “little” shark was released.
Doc Hatton and the posse are back on the Wanderer and were welcomed with improved weather and a gaggle of hungry fish.
The battleground was less than a mile from Garza point and the Wanderer defended her home turf by building up a classic feeding frenzy. The first catch was a juvinile Yellowtail Snapper, followed up by a medium-sized Nurse Shark.
An inauspicious start indeed, however this is the first phase of stirring up a bottom fish bite. Sure enough the action coaxed some big fish up from their seafloor hiding spots.
This Broomtail Grouper is a real monster! Right behind it was another nice-sized bottom dweller:
The bite stayed strong and a group of Jack Crevelle swung by to investigate the fishy waters.
The final jewel in the Wanderer‘s bottom fishing crown was this nice Rooster fish.
We release this species, but with the massive Snapper and Grouper catches from earlier it is safe to say that Doc Hatton and his group will be well-stocked with filets this week.
Excellent day of Dorado action for Irene and Bruce Page on the Wanderer.
The green monsters came in at a steady pace and the whole group got a change to master these Mahi Mahi.
Some people think that First Mate Alex has to best gig in town, but it’s not all smiling in the photos with world class fish…guess who got to release this accidental Shark by-catch?
Hall of Famer Dennis Paul returned to the Explorer for action, only this time they headed offshore about 10 miles to see what was happening in the blue water.
Early on in the trip they found a small school of Yellowfin Tuna and Dennis Paul added sushi to his menu in the form of two excellent 25lbs. Yellas.
Look at the girth on this fella:
The billfish weren’t biting as aggressively as usual in the afternoon, and I think Dennis managed to bury a hook in the reason why:
This 6-8 foot long Shark was skulking the area which most likely pushed the billfish a little more offshore. It’s neat to see a shark so close, but as we have no interst in eating it this fish was released unharmed.